quakers and baptists 1647-1660 - biblicalstudies.org.uk · 2013-07-23 · quakers and baptists...

Quakers and Baptists 1647-1660

THE Interregnum was a period of intense religious excitement and speculation which not only affected the older "Puritan" sects-the

Presbyterians, Independents and Baptists--but also resulted in the creation of a multiplicity of smaller, more radical sects. Despite mutual jealousy and competition, all the sects saw it as the Age of the Spirit, a feeling that helped to create millenarian expectancy which, in turn, interacted with the political events of the time. Religiously and politically, the first decade of the Interregnum was dominated by the Puritans, but their pre-eminence was uncertain, for it was an era of individualism, thanks in part to the increasing hordes of "Masterless Men", not least of which were those in the New Model Army-an army which, aided by increased social mobility in the civil war, was able to link up numerous radical groups which had thitherto existed in the lonely outposts of the north and west of England. With those elements went class and even generational tensions, exacerbated by a "tradition of plebian anti-clericalism and irreligion".l Laymen often found themselves actively and independently searching for the Truth, if not in Scripture, then within themselves. It was this milieu, combined with political disillusionment with those Puritans in power, that was to influence the rapid growth of the Quakers--the strongest radical challenge to Puritan predominance prior to the Restoration. In many respects the Quakers appeared to be all things to all people. Their vague political notions, their apparent social protest (the use of "thee" and "thou", hat honour and refusal to swear), their emphasis on freedom for the individual conscience and their attitude towards Scripture, the ordinances and sin, all appealed to former "True Levellers", Seekers and Ranters. Similarly, they appealed to many radical Puritans, for although Quaker theology tended to be antithetical to the central Puritan emphasis on the Word and the ordinances, Quakerism carried forward "a development already well advanced within radical Puritanism; was an emphasis, a fusing and a systematization of beliefs which had appeared earlier but which had then been more hesitant, sporadic and unrelated".2 Nor is there much doubt that the Quakers shared "the universal sectarian conviction that ultimately the Saints should govern the world".s However, Friends were intensely antagonistic towards most of the other sects, who in turn reacted as passionately, perhaps none more so than the Baptists.

Baptists and Quakers originally had much in common, especially their opposition to tithes, oaths and "hireling" ministers. Two influences especially strong among the General Baptists were shared by the Quakers--a distrust of human learning and the special place of influence given to "elders" and to itinerant ministers, the latter known among Friends as "First Publishers of Truth". Before George Fox

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QUAKERS AND BAPTISTS 1647-1660 345

had begun to preach, Henry Denne, a General Baptist, had apparently discussed the doctrine of an Inner Light in The Drag-net of the Kingdom of Heaven and in other works.4 There is evidence that Fox, whose uncle Pickering was a Baptist, had drawn his first community of "Children of the Light" from a "shattered" Baptist community in Nottinghamshire.5 Friends themselves mentioned the original "tenderness" of the Baptists. When Fox was garnering converts in 1647-8, he commented, in relation to tithes, that the Independents, Baptists and Presbyterians "had a tenderness at their first rise". Unfortunately, wrote Fox, "when they were got up and got many members, they began to make laws and orders . . . and when they got farther into the outward power, then they all got into steeplehouses and tithes".6 lames Nayler agreed that the Baptists had betrayed their tender origins. In a bitter attack, he asked the Baptists to examine their betrayal of the nation and of the Lord and queried:

"Was there not a time when you durst not have conformed to the world . . . their fashions and customs now maintained, their false worships? Was it not once with you that you could not use the world's language, as to their corruption therein upheld, and that out of tenderness of conscience? Was there not once in you a principle against lying and false accusing, and perfection for conscience sake? Then was you hated of the world as you now join with the world to hate us and belie us. Nay, what thing is it now that your conscience will strain at, but you can swallow, rather than suffer persecution, reproach or loss of gain? Have not you been witness against the ministry of the nations to be of the whore, and their tithes and hire, till a great part of the most eminent of you be got into the same living out of which you have thrust them ... ?"7

Disillusioned sentiments such as these confirm that the two systems "seemed to have a mutual repulsion and . . . a strong feeling of hostility, especially between the Quakers and General Baptists".8

The intensity of feeling between the two groups should not be underestimated. Alexander Parker, a prominent "First Publisher of Truth" summed up the feelings of many leading Friends during the Interregnum when he characterized the Baptists as a people "high . . . in notion, ... [who] have built strong castles and are full and rich. It will be very hard for them to enter into the Kingdom though they generally confess the words, yet cannot bear true judgment, and really I see publicans and harlots enters into the Kingdom before such". 9

One obvious cause of friction was the threat which the Quakers posed to the Baptist movement, particularly to the General wing, whose foundations by 1654 had been shalcen causing some churches to change their views while others "were terribly rent" Some Baptists went so far as to claim that one thousand Quakers had come out of the north to scatter their churches.lo The same milieu that had influenced the Quakers had also influenced many Baptists. With the emphasis on the individual search for Truth, it was not surprising that many

346 THE BAPTIST QUARTERLY

individuals moved increasingly into more radical channels. As mentioned, the Quakers had many common ideals with Baptists of various shades, but especially with the General Baptists who were no doubt more receptive to the concept of the Light in every man than were the Particular Baptists. Wavering Baptists may also have been impressed with the open disavowal by Quakers of so many elements of orthodox theology, when other radicals, including Baptists, had shied away from the full implications of radical Puritan thought. Hence whereas the Baptists had restricted the ordinance of baptism by abandoning affusion of infants, the Quakers dispensed with it entirely, as they likewise did with the ordinance of the Lord's Supper.l1 Perhaps equally influential was the tendency of Friends to remain steadfast in their championing of the individual conscience and of the need for Saintly government, whereas the Baptists had shown signs of compromise with the Beast. In any case, that the Quakers were a serious threat to the Baptists cannot be doubted, as Baptist records themselves indicate. The General Baptist church at Chatteris reported that William Custons, John Dring and Thomas Rosse, carried away by the Quakers, "were accused by the Brethren for denying the Scriptures and the ordinances of God and for affirming that the doctrine preached and received by them was not the doctrine of Christ, but the doctrine of the Devil". Several months later, John Denne and Edmund Mayle were sent to visit the three men but "they being all of one mind refused to hearken . . . and perceiving no hope of repentance, we excommunicated them".12 Similarly the General Baptist church at Littleport was reluctantly forced to excommunicate two prominent elders, Samuel and Ezekiel Cater, along with a number of other members for turning to the Quakers and their "wicked whimsies and nonsensical interpretations". Broadmead church in Bristol lost nearly one-fifth of its membership with the defection of Dennis Hollister, none of whom apparently returned to the fold. ls

Nor were the Particular Baptists immune as their church at Hexham lamented the incursions of the Quakers into those parts, "whose pernicious ways many do follow; a generation whose main design is to shatter the churches of the Saints by stealing away the tender lambs out of the folds of the Lord Jesus". By the following year, two of those "tender lambs" had been seduced from the Hexham church as well as six from the Newcastle church.14 The church at Kensworth reported "that the people called Quakers have by crafty instruments much divulged their tenets among them, but God hath been good in keeping His people from being carried away by them". God was not so good to the church at Oxford which reported that two members were "lately fallen to the Quakers" nor to the church at N ewbury which feared "that some members are inclining to the Quakers".15 Matters reached a point where the Baptist Western Association meeting at Tiverton in September 1657 was forced to repeat a warning given in its Confession of Faith of 1656 against those "who lay aside Christ, Scripture and obedience all at once, subjecting themselves to a sugges-


tion or voice within them more than to the mind of God written in the Holy Scriptures", a pointed reference to the Quakers.16

Although the total number of Baptists who became Friends will probably never be known, many of the known converts became leading Friends.17 One of the first converts of importance was Rice Jones, the leader of those "shattered" Baptists of Nottinghamshire.1s Of greater long term importance was the gradual convincement of Samuel Fisher at Lydd and at Romney, in Kent in 1655. George Fox was at the meeting at Romney where many people had come including some of the chief Baptist teachers, one of whom, George Hammon, "was bitter and did oppose". However Fisher "did publicly oppose Hammon" and soon after, was following Fox to "many meetings that away". 19 Another leading convert from the Kentish Baptists was Luke Howard, a shoemaker, who had been a member of a Particular Baptist group for eleven years.20 In Bristol, the Quakers convinced Dennis Hollister, a member of Broadmead church and a representative of Somerset for the Nominated Parliament. While in London, Hollister, disillusioned with his fellow Baptists, had (recorded Edward Terrill) "sucked in some principles of this upstart locust doctrine [of the Inner Light] from a sort of people afterwards called Quakers" and therefore on his return home, his heart was "full of discontent" and his head "full of poisonous new notions" and from then on "the church would meet no more at his house". 21

With the Quakers posing such a danger, the Baptists were often wisely reluctant to allow Friends to intrude on their meetings, particularly as they would often speak at great length, with less erudition, "according to the movings of the Lord".22 Thus Thomas Morford, at a meeting of Baptists in Waterford, in Ireland, was standing peaceably until Colonel William Lee had finished preaching, and then

"stood upon a form to speak the word of the Lord that was in my heart, as fire, desiring their moderation, I speaking no other things than what is contained in the Scriptures of Truth, but Will[iam] Lee came out of his pulpit and laid violent hands on me and thrust me down, gnashing his teeth on me. Another member of that church, Serjeant Wilson, Constable of the town, laid violent hands on me, and hailed me out of the room and said that I deserved to be stoned to death". 23

In 1654 Edward Burrough and Richard Hubberthome were in London at the Glasshouse, "the mother of all the Baptists in England", and after Burrough had spoken, Hubberthome stood and spoke, but "they shut him out and bolted the door."24 The Baptists at Cambridge noted with distaste that the Quakers "thrust in at the doors" and that their "impudence is beyond measure", while the Broadmead Baptists were no more charitable when they likened the Quakers to Satan "transforming himself like an angel of light [who] strove against the true followers of Jesus Christ". 23

It appears, however, that the Baptists were quite often ready and willing to listen to and dispute with intruding Friends. In Dover, John


Stubbs, himself a former Baptist, reported his being at a Baptist meeting where he had had "as much liberty ... as I could desire".26 In Dublin, Edward Burrough was able to visit the home of Lord Deputy Fleetwood on three occasions during Baptist meetings and found Fleetwood himself "moderate", while at Rye, in Sussex, Richard Hubberthorne and Samuel Fisher visited a general meeting of the "teachers and heads" of the Baptists from Kent and Sussex, at which Hubberthorne was moved to speak "laying open their confusion and emptyness". They asked him questions and he "continued with them till within night, and the next day . . . went again . . . and when the spirit of the Lord gave utterance . . . spoke and continued all that day with them".27

Often of course, it would be the Baptists who visited Quaker meetings especially as the modus operandi of travelling Friends was to appoint a meeting in a particular town and then to invite people of all persuasions to attend, in an effort to gain convincements. Although Friends encouraged and welcomed such opportunities to disseminate the Truth, they often complained about the opposition encountered from Baptists. Luke Howard, a former Baptist, was at a meeting in Deal in which "there come in some preaching Baptists which did belong to the ships of war and with great violence they broke out in a rage to the making of their fall known to all the sober people".28 In Wiltshire the Baptists came to a meeting appointed by John Wilkinson and John Story, who exultingly reported having had "a long dispute and a plain war with the Beast, but the Lamb got the victory, and since that time many falls from them and . . . they have no courage left".29 In Edinburgh George Fox, disgusted with those Baptists who overemphasized the discursive aspect of reason at the expense of the intuitive, complained of their behaviour at a meeting he attended where

"many rude people and Baptists came in and there the Baptists began with their logic and syllogisms, but I was moved in the Lord's power to thresh their chaffy, light minds, and showed the people that after that manner of light discoursing they might make white black and black white, and because a cock had two legs and they had two legs therefore they were cocks and so turn anything into lightness, which was not the manner of Christ nor His Apostles' teachings and speakings."3o

While Baptists and Quakers were prone to complain about mutual intrusions into meetings, both groups welcomed formal disputes, of which there were many. By no means were these frivolous forms of entertainment. From a Quaker point of view, these disputes formed part of their war against the Devil and his advocates. Both sides were struggling to win over not only those committed to the opposing side, but also the many uncommitted, the "simple hearts" so often mentioned in Quaker correspondence. To "convince" these would not only ensure the saving of more souls, but would give the necessary vitality, creativity and numbers to the movement (as well as increasing


its diversity). Letters and pamphlets written by early mInistering Friends involved in such disputes would therefore often emphasize the impact on the people present. George Fox and Edward Pyott at Poole in 1655 disputed with Walter Spurrier "to the great satisfaction and comfort of diverse of those present, several being convinced of the ... Truth", while James Nayler in Northumberland had a meeting in the home of a Baptist where two Baptists "stood up for their form", but their "deceit" was "laid open and all the people more convinced by it".S1 Similarly in Wiltshire, John Wilkinson wrote of a dispute which had had the result that the Baptists dared not "speak publicly against us, lest their hearers do forsake them, who saw them overthrown in the dispute".82

Friends were always conscious of their public relations. Often they accused Baptists of lying about them, as part of a concerted effort to discredit the Quakers. Hence George Fox's anger at Richard Stookes with whom he had held a dispute at Grayrigg in 1652. During the meeting, some of the followers of Stookes "stood upon the side of the house and tumbled down some milking pails, the house being so crammed". Stookes, implied Fox, was not content with that explanation of the incident, for when he left "being confounded", he "raised a slander and said the Devil frightened him and took a side of the house down where we were in the meeting, which was all lies, but such as served the priests' and professors' turn to feed upon" . 33

Friends in London reported that Henry Jessey, lately returned from the north, "hath brought many lies and false reports of us", while in Wiltshire Paul Hobson was accused of "declaring many filthy things to render the Truth odious".S4 The importance of attending a dispute was underscored by a letter hastily sent by Thomas Patching to George Fox and other ministering Friends in 1659:

"I being at Arundel sessions, Friends informed me of a challenge made for a dispute with Friends, all and any except Joseph Fuce. This was sent in writing by the greatest wicked Baptist champion in the south, Matthew Caffyn, and some Friends returned answer to him in writing that he should be met for that purpose on the 19 day of this eleventh month [January] at Chichester where they give out they shall have the city hall for that purpose and that if Friends do not meet them there, they should forever stop their mouths, so that in all likelihood the expectation of the people may be very great and so of the greater concernment and the more to be taken notice of."s5

Many disputes were carried further by pamphlets, for the Interregnum proved to be a period of refreshing freedom from the restrictions imposed on printing both before 1641 and after 1660. That feature, along with the religious inclinations and prejudices of numerous printers, aided in a massive outpouring of sectarian pamphlet literature. The significance of these pamphlets is immeasurable for they give not only invaluable information as to the times and sites of many disputes, but the arguments put forth by each side. Not


all pamphlets dealt with disputes. Many were answers to queries, responses to other pamphlets or simply straightforward attacks on opponents, all of which give valuable insights into the thinking of the writer or writers. Opponents of the Quakers were often appalled by the language employed by Friends in their writings, but may have been aware that such behaviour was not unusual for "enthusiastic" movements since they often tended towards "violent and unbridled language in their beginnings". 36 Yet Baptists were unlikely to look charitably upon Friends when they were characterised as "ministers for Satan" or "pleaders for sin". Vavasor Powell, for example, was singled out by Alexander Parker as one who exceeded many other teachers "in railing, backbiting and casting many false aspersions upon the Innocent people", while Dennis Hollister called the Broadmead church "a Synagogue of Satan, and a cage of unclean and hateful spirits, in which lodgeth pride, hypocrisy, envy, slandering, backbiting, railing, lying, love to this present world and conformity to the fashions, customs, and conversation of the same".37

As seen in pamphlets, letters and journals, the struggle between Quakers and Baptists encompassed religious, social and political disagreements which often were difficult to disentangle. Nonetheless Baptist writers tended to concentrate their attacks on the theology of the Quakers, which in turn caused Friends to defend their principles while attacking those of the Baptists. However, the greatest difficulty with analysing Quaker doctrine during the Interregnum was its apparently fluid nature, since recent research has demonstrated the intrusion of attitudes contrary to those which originally separated the Quakers from other sects. Thus Friends were often defending principles from which they were receding or often found themselves defining their beliefs "defensively, by negatives".38 Nor were Friends always in agreement with one another despite efforts at imposing an outward uniformity through official and self-imposed censorship, a problem which led Jeremiah Ives to remark sarcastically, that where Quakers were concerned, "not one of ten shall give the same answer with the first".39 Yet there was sufficient outward uniformity of Quaker thought to be able to grasp the basic doctrines they propagated during their first decade and to understand the abhorrence with which many Baptists regarded them.

The one concept which did not change clnd which was the "contradistinguishing Quaker principle" was their doctrine of the Inner Light of Christ. The belief in an Inner Light was not new to Puritan thinkers, but what differentiated Quaker thought on this point was their emphasis on the Spirit of Christ in every man from the Beginning and whether converted or not.40 With that as a basic framework, much of Quaker thought naturally followed-their attitudes toward perfectibility, the Letter, the ordinances and Christ Himself; their views on all these subjects were denounced since they were based on what Puritan thinkers saw as a faulty premise. To contemporaries, the greatest ambiguity in Quaker thought occurred in relation to their


apparendy lax attitude toward the Trinity and the symbolism of the crucifixion and resurrection. Friends themselves appeared uncertain on these issues41 and their own confusion, along with misunderstandings by Baptists, led several of the latter to attack what they regarded as Quaker equivocation. One Baptist accused Friends of studying and devising "deceitful terms, that look with two faces, like the Oracles of the heathen Gods, that they may the better effect their deceits", a thought echoed by John Pendarves when he asked:

"Do you not by many of your sayings (which admit of a double construction) craftily hide your persuasions in many things from the sight of some honest people, who take you to hold the same truth with believers in general, concerning Christ, the Scriptures and the resurrection of the dead . . . and is not this dissimulation at the best, or lying after the manner of Ananias and Sapphira ... ?"42

Also abhorrent to many Baptists was the claim by Friends that they shared the same Light as the Aposdes and often seemed to be promoting the Light in themselves against the Light in the Scriptures. Whereas formerly "God's word in Scripture ... [had] been treated as the criterion by which to test faith and experience", now the Quakers appeared to judge the Scriptures by their own Spirit.4s As for the Light itself, John Tombes in a dispute with George Fox at Leominster argued that it was a "natural light and made light", an argument also used by Thomas Collier, who added that the Quakers hearkened "to the voice of Satan, or at the best your own deceitful hearts".H Matthew CatIyn also admitted that there was a light in man, but only "as to know that there is a God and in measure also what is just and good, according to that he was first created in, and so in measure evil, when he walks contrary to this light". However, he continued, to that light was added "the Written Law, which remains to us". The Quakers, he warned, must not adhere to a light within "as their ONLY teacher".45 Friends would reply by denoting that the Light was not that of reason, nature or conscience but "was divine and spiritual from Christ", and therefore James Nayler warned Thomas Collier that he had opposed the Light of Christ "which is the Light of the world" and which would lead to God, unlike Collier's "naturallight".48

Nor were many Baptists any happier with the Quaker claim to freedom from sin, a claim often contradicted by the erratic behaviour of certain early Friends, culminating in the scandal of James Nayler. Since Friends felt that they possessed "the same Spirit as inspired those who gave for the Word", they naturally went one step further and claimed "infallible guidance".47 Their position was stated by Robert Wastfield in An Equal Ballance:

"The perfection which the people called Quakers own and press after, is the same which the Saints and servants of God in all ages did press after, of which the Scriptures of Truth makes mention, which is to perfect holiness in the fear of the Lord, and


to know Him to work all their works for them and in them, whose works are perfect in the sight of God, whereby all boasters and boasting is excluded".48

Such a view, of course, often led Friends to attack the "worldliness" of the Baptists. Thus in Ireland, William Morris noted that if Friends went into the "parish temples" they would find men "daubed with lace, their hats and their garments hung with ribbons, . . . their heads powdered like millers, their breeches like coats, cuffs near the elbows, and boothose tops to the heels" and women "with naked necks and collars about them, their arms pinioned like felons condemned, with manifold like abominable attire". Yet if those same Friends went to Baptist meetings, where they expected a more sober assembly, they would find "such monsters as these . . . which you call Brethren and Sisters".49 In England, Humphrey Wollrich noticed the same tendency among Baptists there, who had re-acquired their "silk garters and fancies and . . . silver and gold laces" and in fact now pleaded for them by means of the Scriptures which they had formerly used to "plead against them".50 Thomas Curtis, a former Baptist, had first hand experience at a meeting which he attended:

"but the Baptized people which were met together when we came ... (I think I may say), every man with his tobacco pipe in his mouth . . . made such a smoke in the room that it stank exceedingly, and after Friends was come, they so continued notwithstanding the room was thronged, until J 0 [hn] Crook stood up and spoke, and when we had ended, like swine whose nose must still be in the trough, they with so much eagerness followed the tobacco pipe again as if they had been famished".51

Baptists and others who mocked Quaker claims of perfection would earn the epithet of "pleaders for sin". When Vavasor Powell warned that no man could be perfect "whilst he was in this life or in the body on earth", Morgan Watkins more than mildly chastised him: "0, thy sottish blindness makes thee grope at noon day, strain at a gnat and swallow a camel. Why dost thou pray against sin, while thou believest thou cannot be delivered from it on earth?" Powell also received a blast from Richard Hubberthorne when the latter, after another dispute, calmly asserted that Powell "was one who ministered for Satan and pleaded for sin".52 Major John Wigan was similarly reproved by George Fox who wondered at this "strange doctrine", adding that Christ had come "to destroy the Devil and His works and the power of sin and so to cleanse men from sin". Yet the last word belonged to the Baptist Jeremiah Ives who agreed that the Quakers were perfect"in the art of deceiving, lying and equivocation".5s

Quaker emphasis on the Holy Spirit led them to reduce the importance of Scripture, a tendency which led many Baptists and others to decry what they believed was a total disregard by Friends for the Word. In Puritanism, the "normal, central emphasis ... is upon the closest conjunction of Spirit and Word". The Quakers became the first who "in any systematic way" disturbed this con-


junction.54 By stressing the Light within as the only teacher, Friends did leave themselves open to the charge of denying Scripture, although they would often utilize Scripture to prove their own arguments. Yet they did stress that by itself the Letter "is death" while the Spirit "is life" since only by accepting the Spirit can the Letter be properly understood. 55 Humphrey Wollrich warned the Baptists that "the spirit of the Lord God never led you by your own confession, who say the Letter is the leader, guider and teacher", while James Nayler elaborated by explaining that Christ ascended, but the Letter of the Apostles did not, "nor could before it was written, for then it was no Letter".56 However, Baptists like Caffyn and Ives hinted darkly that the motive for Friends in tearing down the Scriptures was simply "to raise up the honour of their own pamphlets". 57

With the relative decline in importance of Scripture went a complete disavowal of the necessity for the ordinances. Friends were particularly anxious to prove the fallaciousness of baptism by water, arguing that it could only be by the Holy Spirit and with fire. Nor was the Lord's Supper to be continued as an outward ordinance "for Christ had appointed it only until He came again".58 Thus when Thomas Morford was warned by William Lee, the Baptist Governor of Waterford, and by William Lamb, a Baptist pastor, that he was damned for not abiding "in the doctrine and ordinances of Christ", he replied that, in fact, the Quakers obeyed "those weightier commands and ordinances which is fulfilled through faith, mercy and judgment upon the head of the transgressor".511 George Fox, in a debate in Leicestershire with Samuel Oates and other Baptists in 1649, demanded to know who had baptized John the Baptist and who had baptized Peter, John, "and the rest of the Apostles". Fox then put it to them to prove "by Scripture" that they had been baptized in water, but Oates and the others "were silent".60 Friends argued that the Disciples had been sent, not to baptize by water, ''but to preach and to baptize in the Name, which Name of the Lord consists not in words and syllables, but purity, righteousness and holiness", and that Paul had baptized by permission and not by commission, since he too had been sent by Christ "to preach".61 Richard Famworth summed up the sentiments of many Friends toward water baptism when he called Thomas Pollard "the great water baptizer", and those who followed that practice "outward dippers and outside washers, who maketh clean the outside of the body or vessel ... [but] are hard bound up in a dead form".62

Friends also had to defend themselves from Baptist sarcasm relating to their "quaking". The Quakers, argued Thomas Collier, had substituted a new way to attain justification. Whereas the Baptists held attainment of justification by faith in Christ crucified, the Quakers, wrote Collier, "affirmed that their quaking is the spirit of burning, through which all must pass to enter into righteousness and justification, by which sin must be destroyed". Thus, he concluded, they "have found another way to go to God than by Christ the Mediator". 6S


When Friends responded that "the Prophets, Apostles and Saints did witness trembling and quaking and did yell, howl and roar", Jeremiah Ives would reply that "the Devils were quakers and tremblers" and in any case, "none of the Saints of old did ever foam at mouth in . . . their trembling, but some of you do, as many are able to witness".64

One weakness in the Baptist position which Friends were anxious to exploit, at least until the N ayler episode, was the marked tendency of the Baptists toward diversity. Humphrey Wollrich succinctly summed up the feeling of many Friends who felt that, at the least, the Inner Light had brought Friends into unity, not diversity, but as for the Baptists,

"one of you is crying, 'I am for general redemption', and another 'I am for particular election'; one is for eating of blood, and another is against it; some for washing of feet and others own it not; one for laying on of hands and another against it ... and some of them are so blind that they say they cannot call any 'Brother' until they have been baptized in the water, though it be but an hour before they are baptized and yet a month before that . . . they examined them about their faith and . . . judged them believers".65

Although the Baptists tended to concentrate their attacks on Quaker doctrine and practice, Friends often countered with tracts emphasizing their bitterness over the Baptist "betrayal" of the Saints. The Quakers, in common with many radical Puritans, had seen the execution of Charles I as preparing the way for the reign of King Jesus. They shared in the millenarian excitement, and in fact, it is unlikely that Quakerism would have been possible as a mass movement without that excitement.66 Although not active in plotting Friends were keenly interested and involved in the political and military events of the Interregnum, and like so many others, saw the Nominated Parliament of 1653 as the means for putting their ideas into practice, for "the obverse of the liberty of the Spirit is the Government of the Spirit".61 With the failure of that Parliament of "Saints" after only five months, much of the militant millenarian enthusiasm died down, with several Fifth Monarchists becoming Quakers. Yet Friends did not give up their hopes for tlle Government of the Spirit, one aspect of which was toleration for the Saints. It was the apparent betrayal of that Spirit which aroused many Friends against the Baptists. Friends had concluded that "conscience is the ground of lIberty, and furthermore that it conditions it", and therefore they firmly believed it was the duty of the State to promote toleration.8S They protested, therefore, at the attitude of the Baptists in power towards Friends and believed that they had turned their backs on the war against the Devil. Baptists had taken benefices, raised up their own ministers, read sermons which they finished at appointed times, rather than preaching as the Spirit moved them, and often expelled Quakers forcibly from their gatherings by calling in the magistrates. All of these were anathema to the Quakers. For example,


Friends had carried to its ultimate expression the concept of "prophesying" by eliminating a separated ministry and relying completely on extempore lay preaching in meetings according to the movings of the Lord.69 Their ideal was stated by Thomas Morford who had been reproved by a Baptist pastor for interrupting the latter's sermon:

"I answered, had not that been a false prophet that was speaking he would have been subject to me, or to the spirit of the Lord in me who had His word to declare, for so are the spirits of the true prophets and not to limit the spirit of the Lord by an hour glass or to make a law to quench the spirit of the Lord, but if anything be revealed to another that stands by, the first is to hold his peace though he be not bid be silent, for our God is the God of order and when He moves one to speak that is silent, the other that is speaking which is guided by God's spirit, stops and is silent". 70

Therefore Friends would ask the Baptists where in Scripture they found that the Ministers of Christ "did set up an hour glass to preach by as you do, . . . did invent what to say before hand, and wrote it down as some of you do" or had ever appointed "a certain number of their members to speak at set times and call it 'disorder' for any to speak besides them whom they did appoint?"71

It was in fact the Baptist stance towards "disorder" that led to numerous unpleasant incidents involving Quakers. This was exacerbated by the fact that in England during the Interregnum, many Baptists held positions of power in the army, the fleet and the government. A number of ministers had even accepted benefices or other state paid appointments in the established church. Those developments may have hardened an already antagonistic feeling among many Baptists towards Quakers. Thus at Warwick, George Fox was at a meeting, after which "some of the Baptists began to jangle" and soon after the bailiff of the town with some of his officers came and secured Fox and three other Friends.72 In 1656 at Leominster, John Scaife and Alexander Parker had a meeting in a large orchard. While Scaife was speaking the bailiff of the town came with John Tombes, "the Baptist priest of Leominster", and detained Scaife, and when Parker stood up to speak, he too was taken prisoner. Tombes was active again in 1657 when George Fox visited Leominster. During their dispute, Tombes, apparently frustrated at the direction in which it was headed, demanded that the magistrates take Fox away, but that time the attempt proved abortive.73

The situation in Ireland proved even more difficult for Friends, particularly in the early 1650s. The rise and spread of the Baptists in Ireland had been swift, although apparently confined to the garrisons of the army where they were often patronized by the Governor. They were also aided by the failure of Lord Deputy Fleetwood to curb them, despite what was rapidly becoming a politically dangerous movement. By 1655, it was reported that twelve military governors,


along with members of the civil administration, were Baptists. Francis Howgill, an early Quaker visitor to Ireland complained that the army officers had "bowed down to the idol Baptism for promotion, for it grew in great fashion a while here".74 Edward Burrough, Howgill's "yokefellow", in concurring that the rulers in Ireland were Baptists, added bitterly,

"but [ they] are seated in darkness and takes their ease in the flesh upon their lofty mountain and have turned their victory into their own exalting and now are waxed fat and kicks against the Lord, but open war I proclaim against them in every town and city and sounds a defiance against the idols Gods which they have set up in their hearts to bow down unto, and a fire is kindled in this nation and in every town burns about me, and yet I am not consumed and in lies and slanders the Dragon and His servants abounds even to the taking away my life if they have power".75

Burrough had cause to be bitter, for in Waterford alone, he had been opposed five times by the rulers "which are Baptists" (the Baptist Governor was Colonel Richard Lawrence), was once tried as a vagabond and once examined by them "for a Jesuit". Nor was he any more successful in Kilkenny where the Baptist Governor, Daniel Axtell, had him forcibly removed from the Baptist Assembly.76

The pattern of power changed in Ireland with the arrival of Henry Cromwell in July 1655, as he worked to reduce Baptist power, at first by reducing the power of the military and when that failed, by openly working against them. Yet in May 1659, Thomas Morford was still able to complain of the treatment he had recently received from Colonel William Lee, the Governor of Waterford, who was also a Baptist teacher. 77

With the failure of the millenarian movement in the early 1650s, Friends tended to keep a lower profile in relation to the outward manifestation of the Kingdom. Their political activity declined further with the establishment of the Protectorate, although they had not become disillusioned with the cause for which they had fought, but simply with the betrayal by those in power. Yet Friends were not completely passive as they continued to demand toleration, along with firm dealing by the magistrates toward those who opposed the Saints. Nor had they conclusively decided against holding office in the State or in the army. Thus even before the death of Oliver Cromwell, Jonas Dell had appealed to the Baptists in the Army, in London and in the country to "consider how far you are gone out from the Saints rule and how far you are out of the Saints life", and he lamented that he "did not think at Marston Moor fight, nor several other engagements since, that ever any of the innocent Lambs of God should have been beaten and put in prison for reproving sin . . . [ and] for crying out against the ministers of Anti-Christ". Had the "thousands and ten thousands that hath been slain, in pretence to throw down the Kingdom of Anti-Christ" all died in vain?78

~UAKERS AND BAPTISTS 1647-1660 357

At the time, Dell's lament may have seemed but a cry in the wilderness, yet with the death of Oliver Cromwell in September 1658 a resurgence of millenarian excitement occurred and hopes were high that an accommodation might be worked out between the officers and the rank and file of the army, the parliamentary republicans and the religious sectaries, in an effort to revive the "good old cause" and defeat Royalist pretensions. Friends played an active role in the events of 1659, although they distrusted both the Rump Parliament and the army "grandees". They even drew up and presented lists to Parliament of those they considered acceptable magistrates, including Friends themselves.79 The sectaries, including Baptists and ~uakers, had evidently drawn closer together. This was signalled by the appearance of a pamphlet by Henry Denne entitled The Quaker no Papist which, while uncomplimentary to George Whitehead, defended Friends from the accusation that they were papists in disguise. Denne saw the accusation as the work of the Presbyterians and Prelatists in an effort to split the Saints. That the ~uakers needed his defence, Denne had no doubt, since they were "a people, as to matter of conversation, most estranged from the fashions of the world, and . . . so unprovided of all humane help, that they are as little able to vindicate themselves as the Papists".80

Unfortunately, from a ~uaker point of view, not all the Baptists were as concerned with the godly cause as Denne appeared to be, for on 12th December 1659, the leading Particular Baptists and some General Baptists in London, sensing the defeat of the "good old cause", issued a Declaration redressing certain "misrepresentations" commonly held about Baptists, one of which was their countenancing "the People called ~uakers in their irregular practice". While not desiring to deprive the ~uakers "of their just liberty, while they live morally honest and peaceable", these Baptists stressed that there were "none more opposite to their irregular practices then we are, nor are there any that they have expressed more contradiction to in matters of religion then against US".81 With those words and with their apparent acceptance by most Baptists, any flickering hopes for the revival of the "good old cause" were extinguished. One ~uaker writer felt the Declaration was rather "a begging of pardon of the Cavaliers, than a vindication of that Truth and Cause once contended for".82 The ~uakers reacted vehemently to what they regarded as the final betrayal by the Baptists, not only of the movement as a whole, but of the ~uakers themselves. It was this last aspect that led Edward Burrough to decry an attack on a people who had, he felt, never done the Baptists any harm "saving in crying against the deadness of your forms and traditions and seeming religious practices, and reproving evil in you". To Burrough, the Baptists were hypocrites who "would leave us to the mercilessness of cruel men" in order to save themselves. What was worse, the many differences between Baptists and ~uakers had been "amongst ourselves", but now the Baptists had "accused us


to the whole nation, and not as in a way of debate about religion, but as in matter of State irregularity".8s

Little had changed in the relationship between Baptists and Quakers since that time when George Fox took a community of "shattered" Baptists and turned them into the Children of the Light. In July 1660, two months after the restoration of Charles 11, John Anderdon wrote what Friends would no doubt have seen as the appropriate epitaph for the Baptists of the Interregnum:

"I have felt and borne the burden of your Apostacy, which hath grieved the good spirit of our God, that on the 14th day of the tenth month [December], 1659, in the time of the late revolutions, as I was passing on my way towards London, this was the Lord's complaint touching you, in these words: 'They have betrayed me into the hands of sinners'. When you had a day, time and opportunity put in your hands to do service for the Lord . . . you like fools had not hearts to make use of it". 84

NOTES This article is intended to encourage Baptist historians to examine the

archives of other religious groups for material relating to the early history of their own religion. I would like to thank Pamela Oliver for sharing with me some of her conclusions on seventeenth century Quaker thought. A word of thanks also to Ma1colm Thomas, library assistant at Friends House, for his invaluable advice on sources. Unless otherwise stated, all manuscripts, pamphlets and theses mentioned in this article can be found at the Library of the Society of Friends, London. All quotations have been modernized as to spelling and punctuation, but otherwise are verbatim, and all dates remain in the Old Style, wherein the year began on 25th March, thus making March the first month and February the twelfth month of the year.

1 Christopher Hill, The World Turned Upside Down (Harmondsworth, 1975), p. 25 and passim; cf. James F. Maclear, "Quakerism and the End of the Interregnum: A Chapter in the Domestication of Radical Puritanism", Church Histcry, XIX (1950), p. 241.

'Hill, World Upside Down, chapter 10 and passim; Geofirey Nuttall, The Holy Spirit in Puritan Faith and Experience (Oxford, 1946), p. 151.

'Maclear, "Quakerism", p. 246; cf. Nuttall, Holy Spirit, pp. 110-112, who emphasizes the spirituality of Quaker millenarianism which precluded any use of force; T. L. Underwood, "Early Quaker Eschatology" in Puritans, the Millennium and the Future of Israel, ed. Peter Toon (London, 1970), pp. 91-103. Pamela Oliver has also found a strong millenarian tradition in early Quaker thought.

• Bernllrd Nutter, The Story of the Cambridge Baptists (Cambridge, 1912), pp. 38-39; C. E. Whiting, Studies in English Puritanism from the Restoration to the Revolution 1660-1688 (London, 1931), p. 88; William Braithwaite, The Beginnings of Quakerism (London, 1912), p. 142; cf. William Tallack, George Fox, the Friends and the Early Baptists (London, 1868), chapter 3. T. L. Underwood believes that Denne has been misunderstood and that he did not, in fact, advocate a doctrine of an Inner Light ("The Controversy between the Baptists and the Quakers in England 1650-1689: A Theological Elucidation", unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of London, 1965, pp. 98n-99n). This thesis is not available at Friends House Library.

• The 'Journal of George Fox, ed. John Nickalls (Cambridge, 1952), p. 4; Braithwaite, Beginnings, pp. 43-45.

• 'Journal, ed. Nickalls, p. 392. 'J. Nayler, Deceit Brought to Daylight (London, 1656; Wing N269),

pp. 19-20.


• Whiting, Studies in Puritanism, p. 88. • In a letter to Margaret Fell, 5.iv.1655, Hawkhurst, in "William Caton

MSS", Ill, 276 (hereinafter cited as "Caton MSS"). 10 w. T. Whitley, A History of British Baptists (London, 1923), p. 84;

Edward Burrough to Margaret Fell, summer 1654, London [the dating is my own], in "Caton MSS", Ill, 146.

11 Nuttall, Holy Spirit, pp. 95-96. Underwood believes the Baptists were much nearer to Friends on the question of these ordinances than were the other major Puritan groups but continued to observe them because they had been commanded by Christ ("Controversy between Baptists and Quakers", pp. 3,247).

"Records of the Churches of Christ gathered at Fenstanton, Warboys and Hexham 1644-1720, ed. Edward Bean Underhill (London, 1854), pp. 115, 131.

"Ibid., pp. 141, 144-145; The Records of a Church of Christ in Bristol 1640-1687, ed. Roger Hayden (Bristol Record Society Publications, XXVII, 1974), pp. 110, 112. From 1653, according to Hayden, Broadmead was an "open communion" Baptist Church and did not become a closed communion Particular Baptist Church until after 1687 (p. 105n).

14 Records of Churches of Christ at Fenstanton etc., ed. Underhill, pp. 315, 353.

"Association Records of the Particular Baptists of England, Wales and Ireland to 1660. Part 3,' The Abingdon Association, ed. B. R. White (London, 1974), pp. 192, 194, 204.

16 Quoted in Geoffrey Nuttall, "The Baptist Western Association 1653-1658", Journal of Ecclesiastical History, XI (London, 1960), p. 217.

11 Among those who were fonner Baptists were William Ames, William Bayly, Thomas Budd, Samuel Cater, Thomas Curtis, Samuel Fisher, Dennis Hollister, Elizabeth Hooten, Luke Howard, Francis Howgill, John Stubbs, Thomas Taylor, William Morris and Humphrey Wollrich; see "Dictionary of Quaker Biography" in the Library of the Society of Friends, London.

18 Unfortunately for Friends, Jones also became their first separatist taking many of the former Baptists with him; see Braithwaite, Beginnings, pp. 45-46. 1. The First Publishers of Truth, ed. Norman Penney (London, 1907), pp. 134, 142 (hereinafter cited as F.P.T., ed. Penney); Alexander Parker to Margaret Fell, 18.iv.1655, Hawkhurst, in "Caton MSS", Ill, 278; d. Journal, ed. Nickalls, pp. 209-210.

,. L. Howard, A Looking-glass for Baptists (n.p., 1673; Wing H2986), p. 28; F.P.T., ed. Penney, pp. 131-133.

"Church of Christ at Bristol, ed. Hayden, p. 106; d. Hollister's tract, The Skirts of the Whore Discovered (London, 1656; Wing H2508), p. 13.

"Since the Act 1 Mar. st.2, cap.3 punished those who interrupted a minister in his sermon or when celebrating divine service, Friends would wisely wait until the minister was finished. However the Lord's Day Act, 1656, cap.15 considerably broadened the right of mjnisters to freedom from interference, thus exposing the Quakers to a greater risk of punishment; see William Braithwaite, "The Penal Laws affecting Early Friends jn England", in F.P.T., ed. Penney, pp. 348-350.

,. T. Morford, The Baptist and Independent Churches (London, 1660; Wing M2727), pp. 29-30.

'" Francis Howgill to Margaret Fell, v.1654, London [dating is my own], in "Caton MSS", Ill, 155.

,. Records of Churches of Christ at Fenstanton etc., ed. Underhill, p. 146; Church of Christ in Bristol, ed. Hayden, p. 114.

,. In a letter jointly written with William Caton to Francis Howgill and Edward Burrough, 19.i.1654/5 [year date from Geoffrey Nuttall, Early Quaker Letters (London, 1952), p. 135], in "Swarthmore MSS", Ill, f.151.

2T Francis Howgill to Margaret Fell, 3.vii.1655 [year date from endorsement on the letter and from internal evidence], i.!t "A. R. Barc1ay MSS",


I, f.118 (hereinafter cited as "A.R.B. MSS"); R. Hubberthorne to George Fox, c.20.i.1656/7, Hertfordshire [dating by Nuttall, Early Letters, p. 223], in "Swarthmore MSS", IV, f.14.

28 In a letter to William Caton, 9.viii.1659, Dover [place of origin from Nuttall, Early Letters, p. 266], in "Swarthmore MSS", IV, f.266.

,D In a letter to Frands Howgill and Edward Burrough, 6.ix.1655, Bristol [year date by internal evidence], in "A.R.B. MSS", 11, f.162 .

• 01ournal, ed. Nickalls, p. 321. 31 F.P.T., ed. Penney, p. 80; J. Naylor to George Fox, ii.1654, Durham

[dating by Nuttall, Early Letters, p. 107], in "Swarthmore MSS", Ill, f.71. One of those "convinced" at the meeting in Poole was Waiter Spurrier's wife (F.P.T., p. 81).

"In a letter with John Story to Francis Howgill and Edward Burrough, 6.ix.1655, Bristol [year date by internal evidence], in "A.R.B. MSS", 11, f.162. There is ample evidence in the library at Friends House to conclude that intrusions and disputes involving Quakers and Baptists occurred in every English county, as well as in Wales, Ireland, Scotland and parts of Europe.

"1ournal, ed. Nickalls, p. 145. 34 Edward Burrough and Frands Howgill to Margaret Fell, 29.v.1654,

London, in "Caton MSS", Ill, 140; John Wilkinson and John Story to Margaret Fell, 3.ix.?1655, Rowde [year date tentatively identified by Nuttall, Early Letters, p. 157], in "Swarthmore MSS", I, f.35.

"From Arundel, l1.xi.1658/9, in "Swarthmore MSS", IV, f.216. 3. Nuttall, Holy Spirit, p. 155. 37 A. Parker, A Testimony of God (London, 1656; Wing P383), p. 10;

Hollister, Skirts of the Whore, p. 14 . .. Hill, World Upside Down, p. 236. Pame1a Oliver has concluded that of

those characteristics that first distinguished Quakers from most other sects, only their doctrine of the Inner Light in all men survived intact the first five years.

39 J. Ives, The Quakers Quaking (London, 1656; Wing 11103), p. 40 . •• Nuttall, Holy Spirit, pp. 157-159, 161. ., The tendency of Friends to identify Christ and His Holy Spirit with the

"Seed of the woman" mentioned in Genesis, had caused them to so telescope "the divine processes of creation and redemption as inevitably to reduce the significance for redemption of the coming of Christ and His Holy Spirit in history" (Nuttall, Holy Spirit, p. 159); Underwood believes that the Quakers emphasized the divinity of Christ while denying His human nature ("Controversy between Baptists and Quakers", p. 2). In relation to the Trinity, Friends tended to see distinctions between a pre-incarnate Christ, the Father and the Spirit "in terms of operation and manifestation rather than of 'person' in the sense in which their contemporaries understood that term" (Maurice Creasey, "Early Quaker Christology". unpublished D.Phil. thesis, Leeds University, 1956, p. 71); d. Nuttall, Holy Spirit, p. 175; Howard H. Brinton, "The Two Sources of Quaker Mysticism", Friends Quarterly, VIII (1954), pp. 10-13 .

.. Ives, Quakers Quaking, p. 30; J. Pendarves, Arrows against Babylon (London, 1656; Wing P1l36), pp. 36-37. Matthew Caffyn likewise attacked Friends for their "DOUBLE-MEANING expressions" (The Deceived and Deceiving Quakers Discovered (London, 1656; Wing C206), p. 43. (Capitals are those of Caffyn.)

cs Nuttall, Holy Spirit, pp. 26-28. «10urnal, ed. Nick:alls, p. 295; T. Collier, A Looking-glasse for the

Quakers (London, 1657; Wing C5290), p. 4. "Caffyn, Deceived and Deceiving Quakers, pp. 2, 8. (Capitals are those of

Caffyn.) "10urnal, ed. Nick:alls, p. 274; Nayler, Deceit Brought to Daylight, pp.

10-11. Friends were often misunderstood on this point . ., Nuttall, Holy Spirit, pp. 156-157. (Italics are those of Nuttall.) ··Wastfield, An Equal Ballance (London, 1659; Wing WI033), p. 35.


•• W. Morris, All Your Perticuler Baptists in Ireland, These things are to You, in George Fox, Severall Warnings to the Baptized People (n.p., 1659), pp. 3-4.

,. H. Wollrich, A Declaration to the Baptists (London, 1659; Wing W3290), p. 8.

51 In a letter to George Fox, 5.xi.1658/9, Reading, in "Swarthmore MSS", Ill, f.87. The passages omitted had been crossed through in the original but in no way altered the sense of the passage cited.

"M. Watkins, The Perfect Life (London, 1659; Wing WI068), pp. 11, 34; R. Hubberthorne, Truth Cleared, and the Deceit (London, 1654; Wing H3241), p. 4.

"'Journal, ed. Nickalls, p. 352; Ives, Quakers Quaking, p. 33 . .. Nuttall, Holy Spirit, p. 23. "Richard Farnworth, Truth Cleared of Scandals (London, 1654; Wing

F512), p. 9. 50 Wollrich, Declaration to Baptists, p. 4; Nayler, Deceit Brought to Day

light, p. 8 . .., Ives, Quakers Quaking, p. 7; Caffyn, Deceived and Deceiving Quakers,

p. 19, wherein he calls Quaker writings "THEIR SCRIPTURES". (Capitals are those of Caffyn.)

.. Pamela Oliver, "The Quakers and Quietism", unpublished M.A. thesis, Melbourne University, 1972, p. 12. Friends, of course, believed that Christ had come again, i.e. within them.

,. Morford, Baptist and Independent Churches, pp. 25, 27 . •• 'Journal, ed. Nickalls, p. 46 . .. Wollrich, Declaration to Baptists, p. 10; Farnworth, Truth Cleared of

Scandals, p. 19. 62 Farnworth, Truth Cleared of Scandals, p. 23 . .. Collier, Looking-glasse for Quakers, pp. 1-3 . .. Hubberthorne, Truth Cleared, and the Deceit, p. 8; Ives, Quakers

Quaking, p. 5. James Nayler in response to Ives, denied that Friends foamed at the mouth (Weaknes above Wickednes (London, 1656; Wing N327), p. 3) .

• , Wollrich, Declaration to Baptists, pp. 15-16; for similar sentiments, see Parker, A Testimony of God, p. 22 .

.. For the influence of millenarian excitement on the spread of Quakerism, see Geoffrey Nuttall, The Welsh Saints 1640-1660 (Cardiff, 1957), pp. 70-72.

6T Nuttall, Holy Spirit, p. 119 . .. Ruth Armsby, "The Early Quaker View of the State", unpublished B.A.

thesis, Birmingham University, 1932, p. 11 . .. Nuttall, Holy Spirit, p. 86. 10 In a letter to George Fox and Francis Howgill, 6.iii.1659, Waterford, in

"Swarthmore MSS", I, f.26. 71 Wollrich, Declaration to Baptists, p. 9. 12 A. C. Underwood, A History of the English Baptists (London, 1947),

pp. 74-79; 'Journal, ed. Nickalls, p. 226. T. F.P.T., ed. Penney, pp. 119-120; 'Journal, ed. Nickalls, p. 296. Fox like

wise had unpleasant experiences involving Colonel Robert Bennet and Justice John Sawrey, both of whom were Baptists ('Journal, pp. 126-127, 254).

T·T. C. Barnard, Cromwellian Ireland: English Government and Reform in Ireland 1649-1660 (Oxford, 1975), pp. 100-105; F. Howgill to Margaret Fell, 3.vii.1655, Dublin [year date from endorsement on the letter and from internal evidence], in "A.R.B. MSS", I, f.1l8.

15 In a letter to Margaret Fell, 5.xi.1655/6, Waterford [place of origin given by Nuttall, Early Letters, p. 167], in "Swarthmore MSS", Ill, f.16.

T. Ibid. TT Barnard, Cromwellian Ireland, pp. 106-108; Morford, Baptist and

Independent Churches, pp. 29-30. Morford also had trouble from George Caldron and Samuel Wade, two Baptist teachers at Waterford (Morford to George Fox, 6.iii.1659, Waterford, in "Swarthmore MSS", I, f.26).

T·W. A. Cole, "The Quakers and. Politics, 1652-1660", unpublished Ph.D.


thesis, Cambridge University, 1955, pp. 14, 19-20, 23, 25, 29-30, 33-34, 64-65; J. Dell, A Voyce from the Temple (London, 1658; Wing D913), pp. 37, 44.

,. Cole, "Quakers and Politics", pp. 80, 85 and passim. For the lists submitted by Friends, see Extracts from State Papers, ed. Norman Penney (London, 1913), pp. 6-13, 105-115.

80 Denne, The Quaker no Papist (London, 1659; Wing DI024), pp. 18, 21. Denne called Whitehead "a person wholly unversed in all manner of leaminf (p. 3).

1 Cole, "Quakers and Politics", p. 200; Richard Hubberthome, An Answer to a Declara!ion Put Forth (London, 1659; Wing H3218), pp. 3, 5 .

• 2 Hubberthome, An Answer, title-page. 83 E. Burrough, An Answer to a Declaration Put Forth (London, 1659;

Wing B5983), pp. 12-13, 15. This tract is appended to Richard Hubberthome, An Answer .

.. J. Anderdon, A Visitation in LOTJe (London, 1660; Wing A3084), p. 3. For quite similar sentiments, see John Collens, A Message from the Spirit (London, 1660; Wing C5233).

CRAIG W. HORLE.

The Cambridge Bible Commentary: The book of the prophet Isaiah, Chapters 40-66. A. S. Herbert. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975. pp. xii, 204. £5.50.

This volume, one of two commentaries to appear on Isaiah 40-66 within the last year, forms a companion to the author's Isaiah 1-39 in the same series (reviewed in the Baptist Quarterly, xxv/5 (1974), 237-8). The format continues the usual pattern for the series, and the general reader will appreciate in particular the summaries following each section of the text, enabling him to grasp the main thrust of the prophet's message. One comment, though, on the layout-is it really necessary to devote almost 40 per cent of the book to reprinting the N.E.B. text in large type when space is clearly at a premium?

On critical issues, Professor Herbert takes the view that chapters 40-55 came from a single prophet in the late exilic period, while chapters 56-66 grew out of an Isaianic community around 500 B.C. He also embraces the less widely accepted opinion that the Servant represents a community, or in his own words, "the actual Israel in the moment of redemption" (p. 31), despite the objections raised against this view by North and others.

Theological matters are given particular attention, within the limitations imposed. The spiritual and physical nature of Israel's salvation is well brought out, though the treatment of Isaiah's universalism seems slightly confused, and the description of Cyrus as heir to "the role and functions of the Davidic king" (p. 64) is a little exaggerated. Translation problems also figure prominently, the rather adventurous N.E.B. text often necessitating elucidation, especially when compared with other versions. Seen overall, the book provides a useful introduction to the modem study of these chapters.

M. J. SELMAN.

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